Wankie the Elephant and the President

Written by Roger Wright

Continued from page 1

Kevin Bell, man who runs zoo---a lifer in business who never really wanted to do anything else, stands in shadow of big exhibit, a six inch sheaf of lab results clutched in one hand, other hand rubbing his temples –Kevin Bell can feel it. Like a wind that blows where it chooses. A life force wrapped in eons of elephant time that drives giant creature to hide its vulnerabilities. Elephant’s never look sick or weak. That’s how they protected themselves back on African plains. They never showed a weakness.

Right up until moment that elephant drops.

So while elephant is still standing upright---the elephant looks great. Wankie looks fine. But Kevin Bell and every single other member of that small army of care knows about her lung problems. Just like they knows risks of treatment. So it’s Kevin Bell’s signature that’s on order for that moving van to take Wankie to a zoo in Utah. And he’s ready to accept that. But as he does--a question so loud in his brain that it rings like a steel hammer on bars of exhibit “What’s best for animal? What’s best for animal, what’s best for animal?” A question ringing out like that bass line now coming from trainers’s room to side of exhibit

I know a place

Ain’t nobody cryin

Kevin Bell, actually understanding word accountability, keeps repeating that question to himself. He doesn’t realize that he is whispering question to himself out loud as if by asking question enough times, he could somehow physically will answer to appear.

The air brakes of semi truck whoosh and groan outside service entrance. Off to side, facing some bushes and unseen by truck driver-- a woman is hurriedly putting her TV make up on, getting ready for tonight’s news report. Rae Lynn Henderson, a name she’s grown comfortable with over past 2 years, had just been text messaged from her boss back at Colorado Springs based PDA (People Defending Animals) with order that if Kevin Bell ignored one more e-mail, it would be alright for Rae Lynn to lie down in front of semi truck that was taking elephant out tonight.

As Rae Lynn checked her face, Secretary of Defense and Vice President, are joined in a secure conference call by a man who’s name never appeared in any news stories, now sitting in a comfortable book filled room of a mansion in Arlington Virginia, ,and by blond crew cut, mirrored sunglasses passenger in lead car of President Bush’s caravan. This quiet collection of leaders were being briefed that tiny Cessna had been guided in safely by military air power. There was no threat. It had all been a false alarm. A flight instructor innocently wandering off his path inside restricted airspace. All systems go.

A moment of silence on call, and question was asked: “Do we apprise him of status?” And man with no name answered calmly from his quiet den in Virginia “I don’t believe that will be necessary.”

And as call clicked off; doors of giant moving van in Chicago swung open and that other small army of caretakers circled ramp to watch Wankie take one more walk up inside truck. And here is what onlooker would have seen if they had watched. Every single one of those people got to tell elephant that they loved her. Some of them said it out loud, some to themselves, some said it on their faces with their tears. They told her.

And as that love poured out of those people in this imperfect blessed and full of grace world we all live in, another stroller with a wide eyed child came thru front entrance of Lincoln Park Zoo for very first time. A radio somewhere off in distance plays that bass line

I know a place

Ain’t nobody cryin. . . .

A bass line. Perhaps finest in all of rock and roll soul.

Later that very same night. In cab of truck with windows open on a clear, starlit Nebraska highway. The driver feels load shift. And just as load shifts he too hears bass line

I know a place

Ain’t nobody cryin. . . .

Like a wind that that blows where it chooses. You hear sound of it.. Wankie Elephant goes down.

Slaves' Songs and Freedom

Written by Robert Bruce Baird

Continued from page 1

Clearly, slaves’ world was much more complicated than most slaveholders understood. The slave community supported its members as they dealt with institution of slavery and human relationships within it. {In this way it was an extended family with children being cared for by all and a real strength existed that masters did not have as they competed against each other or screwed slaves to satisfy indecent needs while neglecting their wife and family.} Under power of planters, slaves had to depend on ingenuity, imagination, and creative use of information. They also used whites’ racial stereotypes to their advantage whenever possible. Since slaveholders generally assumed that slaves’ singing connoted contentment and passivity, slaves used music to pass along messages, to control pace of work, to placate a suspicious master, or to subtly comment on a person or a situation for benefit or amusement of fellow slaves. When slaves sang ‘patter-roll round me. Thank God he no ketch me,’ most slaves understood humorous message. Slaves referred to slave patrols, generally made up of poor white men who did not own slaves, as ‘patter rollers’. This song was story of slaves who eluded patrol by cunning and guile. A song urging slaves to ‘Steal away to Jesus’ could alert listeners to an upcoming secret meeting, while ‘Swing low sweet chariot, coming for to carry me home,’ might tell of possibility of rescue from bondage. Other songs about seeking freedom announced ‘people get ready, there’s a train a comin’,’ or told of ‘dark and thorny’ pathway ‘beyond this vale of sorrow’ leading to ‘de fields of endless days.’ Old Testament stories of deliverance from bondage and triumph of good over powerful evil often provided themes for slave songs. The walls of Jericho that Joshua destroyed became a surrogate for bonds of slavery. The message was subtle, but words, musical inflection, pitch, and tone told story of slave’s suffering and determination to be free.” (12 & 13)